This post is part of a series I’m creating connected with Project Service Automation (PSA) for Microsoft Dynamics 365. This time I will review project teams.

In previous posts, I have talked about how to resource project teams and how this can be achieved in a centralised situation. 

In this post I want to quickly describe some of the concepts behind the project teams.

Resource Type

The resources within a type have a resource type. This can be generic, contact, user, equipment, account or group.

We have seen that generic resources are initially used when creating a team, think of these as a placeholder which creates a resource requirement. A requirement that is later filled by the project manager hard booking a resource or sometimes by a Resource Manager proposing one or more resources.

Contacts and accounts are often used. Maybe these reflect the tasks to be completed by sub-contractors on your project.

Users will be commonly used for resources. CRM users are typically used as these can later record details in their time sheets and submit expenses. Meaning they can fully engage on the project.

It is possible to also define a piece of equipment as a resource. Maybe you have some expensive machinery that needs to be booked out on projects in a controlled manner.

Role

Role is the role the resource will play on this project. Each resource cannot “play” more than one role on a project. A resource however can be assigned multiple roles as they can play different roles on different projects.

For example, Bob is a developer on my project. But if we look at Bob’s resource record we can see that he is also classed as a functional consultant. Meaning he can act as a developer or a consultant. Just not both at the same time. We all have many hats but can only wear one at once!

From and To Date

The from and to dates on the project team simply tell us when this resource is available to the project.

Required Hours

Required hours is populated on generic resources, this is the number of hours required for a particular role on the project.

Booked Hours

Booked hours becomes populated when a resource has been hard booked to the project. These are the hours committed to the project.

So far, we have looked at how to build a project team manually and the find appropriate resources. In my next post we’ll look at how to automatically generate the project team. J